The goal of the Assessment and Outreach Core is to provide support for the UCLA CART related research by overseeing the recruitment and performing the comprehensive assessment of subjects with autism or autism spectrum disorders. The Core will also be responsible for the education and outreach component of the CART by coordinating clinical training and educational opportunities within and outside the university community, as well as working with CART subjects to facilitate retainment in research and enhancing long-term follow-up opportunities through enrollment in clinical programs at UCLA. The Core will draw on the strengths of the many clinical and research faculty working with autism patients at UCLA sites and community relationships to identify subjects. The staff of the Core will then perform comprehensive assessments on all subjects. Diagnosis will be confirmed using the gold standard diagnostic tools (ADI-R and ADOS) as well as standardized cognitive and language testing. Subjects will also have neurogenetic evaluations to screen for non-idiopathic autism. This methodology assures efficient, consistent and comprehensive evaluations of all UCLA CART project subjects and facilitates communication between projects regarding subject overlap, utilization, and assessments. The Core will also be responsible for the education and outreach programs with the goal of providing up to date knowledge on diagnosis and treatment of autism spectrum disorders and disseminating new research findings from the CART to faculty, students, community based practitioners, zonsumers and their families. This will be accomplished using the myriad of expertise in autism clinical zare and research of the faculty at UCLA and the coordination of informational sessions and clinical Lraining opportunities throughout the university and the community. Through accomplishment of these goals, which embody those set out in the STAART Center RFA, the Assessment and Outreach Core will be an integral part of the UCLA CART.